I have the Rigid belt/oscillating sander. When sanding , for the most part I only use maybe the bottom inch or two and when that part of the belt wears out I flip the belt to now use what was the top. Then when I wear that part out I throw the belt away, leaving for the most part the center section unused. Yesterday it dawned on me to place a 1x4 on the platform and now I use the center section too. Only took me about 5 years to figure this out!